Lacey Baktus: (free pattern on Ravelry... awesome because you can use up a single skein of sock yarn and make a shawlette that's actually pretty big. You can use any size yarn for this pattern, too, and use up all the yarn you want.)
Garden Wall Scarf: (done from the book, Warm Earth, which is an incredible book written by my friend, Yumiko Alexander... She's amazing. Incredible. Super design genius woman. But she doesn't think she is. She's so humble and so shy when you say anything nice about her or her work. She seems genuinely pleased and surprised when anyone gushes over how good her stuff is. I would knit/crochet EVERY SINGLE THING in her book, which is insane, because you never get a book that good, right? You can buy the book at Tempe Yarn and Fiber, my favorite local yarn shop. I'm pretty sure it's, like, $16. A steal.)
I changed Yumiko's design because I didn't have enough yarn. I only was able to do two of the motifs, and then I put a netting bit between it to turn it into a scarf rather than the original glorious wrap that she had designed.
Remember back a while ago when I said I would do a really long magic trick with five wands and turn yarn into socks for my son? Well, I finally finished the spell work this last week:
These took stinking forever, too. They're the Vilai socks from Cookie A's book, Sock Innovation, which is an essential sock guide. This book, beyond having amazing sock patterns, was my introduction into learning how to read knitting charts. She has such an amazingly well laid out and thought out beginning section in the book that shows, line by line, how the charts are built from written knitting instructions. It was amazing. I am SO grateful to her for laying out the information in the beginning of the book, along with different heels and toes and all of that, so that now I'm a fearless sock knitting (and other kinds of knitting) machine.
Now to the unfinished objects. (This is my confession bit.) I'm just laying it all out so that I know what I'm working on, and it's fun, because I realize it's not so bad.
First up... My Michael Jackson Princess Gloves! These are knit from the most fun yarn ever, I think, with all of these fun little sequins (that's the Princess and Michael Jackson part)... I read once in a fantasy book about a girl getting married who had pearls sewn all over the palms and fingers of her gloves. It said something like, "...showing that the new bride was expected to do nothing more strenuous than lift a goblet..." And that stuck with me. I wasn't even a mom yet.
So as I was knitting these gloves, that image stayed with me. I saw these little sequins poking out and I thought of that. But then they reminded me of Michael Jackson. So it's kind of a fun thing... and then the very obvious joke being that if they're my Michael Jackson gloves, I only need to knit one, right? Which is appealing. But I do need to go ahead and knit the other. These are my personal pattern. Work left: weaving in all the ends on the first glove... (they're in there with my hand in this pic) And finishing the entire second glove.
First lace shawl: Gail (aka Nightsongs), a free pattern on Ravelry.
Surprise anniversary socks for my hot and sexy Adam: (It's my personal pattern... with weird modifications for his weird feet.)
The beginnings of Christmas socks for someone I won't say because even though I'm virtually convinced she doesn't read my blog, I can't ever be too careful. They're the Kai-Mei socks from the Sock Innovation book. I know you can't tell yet. I just started them yesterday. They are to become my first traveling sock, here pictured with their first victim... I mean, MODEL. This is a knitting blog tradition, in case you didn't know. To get people to take pics with a sock. Kiss did it. Barack Obama did it. Several other celebrities have done it. Knitters are crazy. (Spend 3 months knitting a pair of socks, though, and you'll understand why we all want them to get the attention they deserve.)
So, here, with the most worthy and amazing person to ever hold a sock, EVER: My friend, Christy, on her birthday yesterday.
Donna's batwings shawl...
And the Umaro blanket... I love Umaro! It's so pretty!
So the grand total, without hiding or missing ANYTHING, is 6... I have 6 current works in progress. I don't think that's so bad, especially considering that most people can't count on both hands what they're working on. So meh. I could confess to the extent of my yarn stash, but I think that people would laugh at me. It's pretty pathetic. But I like it that way. Too much of anything stresses me out. I think I'm kind of amazing, actually... I manage to fit everything I do into relatively small space in my home. I keep it all contained and picked up. I figure that I can't expect other people to be clean if I won't.
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